Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1887-09-02
Partisan TOmfOOlery.

The Partisan affects to believe that
the STANDARDS reference to the bihu-
lous portions of the North Is untOr-
tunate, because, as it afiirms, it is a
reflection upon that part of the North
which is Democratic" Nothing is
farther from the truth. The liquor in
terest is a parasite, that clings to the
party which handles the reins of pow
er and dispenses the public revenue.
1t is lever in politics, controlled 10y
the coolest heads and the most delibor-
ate Judgment, to meet and resist II
widespread sentiment demanding its
destruction. The party that is i'll the
majority, the power that can formulate
friendly interest into legal provisions
that will tolerate, and protect, if need
be, the traffic, is the influence sought,
and the side that will receive the votes
of the salOon-interest every time,
whether it be Democratic or Republi-
can. 1t was not surprising that, dur
ing the long ascendency of the Demo-
cratic party, the liquor interest should
have become so strongly entrenched
within its lines as to have given it
some very marked indications of
really being the Bourbon" or whisky
party; but We maintain that the quar-
ter of century of Republican rule,
Eliminated it almost entirely from its
old associations and placed it with the
party in power, which was able, in
consideration of services rendered, to
afford it ample protection. We have
only to ascertain the political affilia-
tons of the saloon interest in any
given locality, at any time within the
past twenty years, to determine this
fact, and it speaks with directness to
the understanding that cannot be
swayed by hackneyed assertions which
depend for their stability upon all
ancient lineage permitted to ex-
tend itself down the course OF time
simply because they were deemed too
stupidity absurd for serious disputation.
This, at least, is not one of those
"claims on behalf OF the Republican
party" that has been disputed by
greater minds than ours and its truth
established by ADLER advocates than
the scribe of the Partisan, as that
journal so confidently affirms. The
irresistible logic of events affords the
means of arriving at a just conclusion,
and the premises and argument are
presented in terms SO clear that none
may err in judgment.
The Partisan cannot dispose of the
whole differences between the great
parties of the country by the ailirma-
ton that all that is good and pure
and patriotic, and everything that is
indisputably right in politics, belongs
to the Republican party, and all that
is bad, impure, reasonable and I'M
righteous may be packed upon the
shoulders of its opponents. Still it at
tempts this Quixotic feat, and sug-
gests that as other great minds have
INDUCED in the same rodomontade, it
must pass for truth. Fie, Partisan!
Where is your manliness, when you
thus pin your faith to some great
minds coat-tail? Where is your
blush, when you deliberately publish
such an atrocious falsehood? If great
minds are swayed by the interest of
the demagogue to lie, should small
minds shout peccavi and grovel in the
dust at the feet of the sanity prophet
who communes with the party god?
Oh, no; friend Partisan; life is not
too short to improve every opportun-
ity that may be presented to shoot
folly as it flies.
Now a few words regarding that
grand old party which claims SO much,
and, as the hangman said, wen drop
the subject" What is it? A crazy
patchwork of all the lists and isms that
arose in opposition to the Democratic
party up to 1860. 1t received the
Freesoilers, the Knownothings, the
Wings, the Abolitionists, the Prohibib-
itionists and all other factions into its
capacious NAV, and the Grahamite
who went daft on sawdust bread"
and the Ascensionist ready to do his
part to bring about the millennium that
he might don the robes of glory, eager
ly joined this motley crew. Each OF
the cranky squads brought some
" principle" to be engrafted in the par
ent stem, and the result has been a
tree that bears as many different kinds
of fruit as there are branches OF differ
ent growth. They are united only by
common interest and supreme
hatred of the Democratic party, which
rises up whenever any danger men,
aces the interests of the people from
this incongruous party, as a whole,
and calls a halt. 1t would have been
strange indeed if transcendental hot
heads had not joined this party, where
no credentials were required for en-
trance and no fixed creed had been
determined upon except opposition.
Let us hope that the Partisan will
refrain hereafter from publishing such
silly twaddle as that the Democratic
party ever held human slavery was
right, though its existence was guaran-
teed by the Constitution; that seces-
sion and treason were not crimes,
when a majority of the boys in blue
were taken from its ranks; that there